Fun fact I try to avoid profanity but the evil exes are so evil that the only way to write them in-character is with profanity.

JURRIEN LAUDA- Romeo Auto

I wasn't a soft person, but even I didn't wish that on someone. No one deserves to get eaten by a corpse. Corpses don't even need to eat. That's just unnecessary.

Gidget Ford, District Three mentor

With Theta and Jurrien, I honestly hadn't know. I hadn't gotten to know either of them very well- they were both very guarded. They could have lasted until the end, or they could have gone in the Bloodbath. No one expected things to go the way they did. I was just hoping one of us- the non-Careers, I meant- brought this home. We took the Cornucopia. We could take the Games.

Dahlia Redwood, District Seven female (18)

"We should camp here," I said, about the somewhat dry area under a tree where we'd spent the night.

"It's too close to the water," Romeo said. "We'll get mosquitos."

"Oh, sorry, you're scared of some bugs?" I asked, color rising to my cheeks as he questioned my judgment. "Let's go find a non-buggy place in the jungle."

"Mosquitos carry diseases, dumbass," Romeo said. I didn't care for his tone.

"We just got my spray," I said, pointing at my sponsor gift.

"It is nice that the tree keeps the ground a little dry," Anjou said. "Maybe we can find another tree like this a little farther from the river."

"Guess Mommy's here to break up the argument," Romeo sneered.

Anjou put out his hands palm-up. "Are you two ever not mad? God, I thought my ex was a whiner." He looked down guiltily. "Not Rainbow. She was nice. Another ex."

"Don't get me started on crazy exes. You know my last boyfriend falsely accused me of abuse? People like him make it so hard for actual victims," I said.

"No one accused me of stuff," Romeo smirked. "I'd kill them." His face darkened. "Valencia was a real piece of work, though. Bitch."

"Hey!" I snapped. I shoved a finger at Romeo. "Don't be a misogynist."

"Ooh, what are you gonna do, nag me to death?" Romeo said.

"God, I swear men are trash," I said through gritted teeth. I'd never been with a man who didn't make my life hell.

"But that's not sexist?" Romeo asked. "Women."

"Do you two even like being in a relationship? I enjoyed spending time with my girlfriends," Anjou said.

"Yeah, I'm sure you had a great time playing with blocks and teaching them to read," I said. I couldn't articulate how much loathing I had for Anjou. People like me were trying to find real love and monsters like him thought they deserved civility.

"It wasn't like that!" Anjou's outburst surprised me. He'd been mercifully quiet since we got the alliance together, and he'd barely said a word since Rainbow died.

"What was it like, then? Perhaps you just happen to like grown women who coincidentally look like children? Perhaps you're bad at counting to eighteen?" Romeo joined in.

"I didn't have sex with them because I didn't want to!" Anjou's face went pale as he seemed to try to find a way to suck the words back in. His expression glazed over into a protective sneer.

"If you're gay, why did you keep getting girlfriends?" Romeo asked, more confused than mocking.

"I'm not gay," Anjou said, his voice quieting near the end. "I just... didn't want any."

"Oh." Romeo's mouth curled into a smirk. "You're not... functioning." he grabbed his own crotch like the disgusting man he was.

"No!" Anjou's blush might have belied his statement if he hadn't gone on. "Some people just don't want any."

"Sure," Romeo said. "Not men, but some people."

"Piss off," Anjou said, folding his arms. "This is exactly why I didn't tell people. A guy can't just not have sex, not bothering anyone at all, without people like you making his life hell."

"That still doesn't make the pedo thing okay," I said. Poor Anjou, with his sad little pity-party excuse thinking that made it okay to ruin other people's lives.

"How can I be attracted to kids when I'm not attracted to anyone?" Anjou retorted. "Yeah, Rainbow was too young for me. I didn't look at her that way. I thought she was just... a young girl in a dangerous world. I could keep her safe and show her how the world worked and eventually she'd break off and spread her own wings. And she wouldn't have to worry about her boyfriend taking advantage, because, well."

"Oh, so you're one of those people," I said, my glimmer of sympathy already snuffed out. "Those gross old men who think they're 'teaching' women or 'mentoring' them. The word is 'grooming', honey."

"Well maybe it was bad," Anjou said. "What does it matter anyway? Good people like Rainbow just die in the Bloodbath anyway. Bad people like us get happy endings. Nothing matters, there's no justice, and maybe it's all just a matter of getting what you can before you die, too."

"Finally you're making sense," Romeo said.

"You know what? Go find your own dry tree." Anjou scooped up a bag and shoved in some food and supplies. "I'll leave you two to be the good, perfect people you clearly are. Don't come after me, my gross pedo blood might stink up your hands."

Good riddance, I thought as he disappeared into the trees. He was too soft to do what needed to be done anyway. Romeo and I could handle this on our own.

Laken Dervissey, District Four male (18)

The Bloodbath was quite a turn of events, but honestly, it kind of worked for me. It wasn't ideal to be stuck in the wilderness without my allies, sleeping on the ground instead of in sleeping bags and eating leaves instead of MREs, but I could do this. Though it was hardly their intent, the outlier alliance had wiped out half of my competition. Charm would die in three days on her own. Probably two, since she'd drink dirty water and crap herself to death. Other than the alliance itself, my only real threat was Elias. He'd tried to hide his skill in the Capitol, but a killer knew another killer's walk. He wasn't trained, but a hobbyist killer can be just as effective and far less predictable.

Ripples caught my eye as I stared at the water's surface. I shot my arm forward. The stick I'd sharpened whizzed into the water, sending up bubbles as it coursed downward. I pulled back on the attached rope and felt the jiggling as the impaled fish struggled to break free. It was a lucky break that I'd grabbed my weapon before the chaos broke out. The hook on my rope wasn't a fishing sort of hook, but I tied a spear onto the other and made myself a reusable fishing harpoon.

The fish flopped on the mud beside the river. I went down the rope to the hook end and stabbed the fish to death before sawing my knife down its backbone. You learn a lot about fish in Four. They're not just food. They're also fertilizer, or bait, or even water. Not many people outside of Four knew there was a line of fluid that ran down a fish's back. It was clean even in dirty water and had long been a staple for anyone adrift at sea. Their eyes contained clean water, too.

As I slurped the fish juice, not really enjoying its taste, I thought about what came next. I could live indefinitely in this arena, though of course I wasn't alone. I wasn't sure I wanted to go after the big alliance yet. Plenty of them could defend themselves and the ones that couldn't were protected by their friends. It would be hard to even get close without one of them spotting me.

Elias, then. I'd fight anyone who crossed my path, but it was Elias I was gunning for. I didn't have many clues on how to find him. I'd have to hope I was right about his aggression and seek out other Tributes, hoping he'd be nearby. And of course I'd have to be on the lookout for him hunting me as well, since even the people who fled the Bloodbath would eventually realize the pack wasn't together.

Dirty as it was, I also needed to target the weaker Tributes just for supplies. I could eat and drink easily but the dampness would likely prove to be the biggest killer in this Games. Living in a wet District taught you exactly how much damage mildew and fungus could do. I hadn't been able to get extra socks or clothes in the Bloodbath. If I didn't steal some or cobble some together I'd be miserable within the week.

It really is the Hunger Games, isn't it, I thought. This time, with all the Careers gone and with all the water, it wouldn't be decided by killing. It would be decided by surviving.

Zebulon Charles, District Twelve male (17)

It was eerie being in control of the Cornucopia. I'd been so prepared for brutal survival in a desolate wilderness, and instead we had sleeping bags, a roof, and a warm fire. Beth was stirring soup we'd made with rice from our supplies and shrimp she and I had caught in her fighting net, with Jack next to her peeling shells. We even had salt packets, apparently to aid hydration. It was like a messed-up camping trip.

"Any ideas for tomorrow?" Beth asked absently, not looking up from their soup. She didn't want to say it, I could tell. None of us did. But it was there, hanging over our heads. We were the strongest. Two of us were trained. Everyone was looking to us to start hunting.

"We could string up some empty cans and stuff for an alarm system," Mike suggested. I wondered how his skin condition was faring in the moist air.

"Laken and Charm are still out there," Isabella said. " I guess we have to get them sometime."

It was a safe way to say it. Laken and Charm were both trying to kill us, and probably so was Elias. Isabella had seen him running after Theta, and we knew how that ended up. The others could... they'd die somehow. They'd somehow die without us touching them.

"This is horrible, but if we don't kill Charm and Laken for a few days, they might... bring the numbers down," Beth said.

"What a lovely day, when we get to decide that letting someone else kill a bunch of kids is less bad than doing it ourselves," Mike said. "But there really isn't any way around it, is there?" I winced at the frail note of hope in his voice. I wished I could give him an answer. No, Mike, there really isn't...

"Ouch!" Beth said. Panic flashed over me as I hit the ground, covering my head and peeking through to see whoever was shooting at us.

"It's okay," Beth said. "I just cut my finger on a bit of shrimp shell."

"Oh no," Mike said as we all flocked to them.

"Don't worry. We'd already washed it. It shouldn't get infected," Beth said. "All the same..." she picked up our first aid kit and took out an alcohol wipe.

"Ugh," I said when I saw the little ooze of blood from the small nick.

Mike saw my discomfort. "Don't like blood?"

"I hate it," I shuddered, my stomach still queasy. "And I know you're thinking, 'but he fishes and stuff'. Yeah, but that's not peopleblood."

"It's already done bleeding," Beth said when she took off the wipe. She unscrewed a little bottle and stroked liquid bandage over the cut, wincing a little at the sting.

"All better," she said, holding up her finger.

"Now if no one can ever bleed around me again, that would be great," I joked.

"No one's going to be bleeding anytime soon," Mike said confidently. "We'll take care of each other until... probably the Gamemakers force us apart, to be honest."

"It's weird that- not to jinx it- it's by far the likeliest case that one of us will win," Beth said. "If it's not us, then almost certainly Laken, but I doubt it. There's too many of us."

We looked from one of us to another, each lost in imagining our own deaths or those of our friends. Isabella and Mike looked at each other, Beth looked at everyone, Jack looked, of course, at no one, and I didn't know what to think. I didn't want to lose anyone. I didn't want to die, either, but like I'd told Mike, there wasn't any other way.

No deaths again, since everyone is spread apart and the only killers are jockeying against each other. PS Galvan also received bug spray